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Author Topic: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!  (Read 11090 times)

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Offline Snake X

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TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« on: March 01, 2011, 04:53:48 pm »
This morning, I went into our tech office and lo and behold was the employee. Before I begin, thank you for all your help in making this possible. Let's begin!

me: Hello, I heard you work with TI, is this true?
Person: No, I don't work with TI, but I work very close to them. I freelance for them and do stuff with them.

Me: OK, in that case, may I see the new calculator?

[Person pulls out new Nspire CX out of his gym bag, still bubble wrapped]

Me: ah very nice. Very nice indeed [explores it a little, goes to documents folder first thing but finding many documents so I exited]. Now does this have any new programming capabilities?

Person: No, it does not any have new capabilities from the current generation Nspire, it only has basic programming functions to solve mathematical equations. There are about only 300 people that work in the educational division of TI, so they were trying to mainly push out the 3D capabilities and the color screen mostly, so the programming was not changed in the new calculator. Sorry about that.

Me: Do you think that there will be any plans for future calculator programming on these?

Person: No, there are no plans to give any additional programming functions as far as I am aware. And I know there are many people that care about gaming and that stuff...
 
Me: definitely

Person: ...but really the teachers don't really care about programming capabilities. TI is always trying to improve their calculators, but this one will mainly focus on graphing and color. Perhaps next time..

Me: So the teachers are the ones that are influencing the direction of this?

Person: Yeah. The main thing is getting what the teachers want and that is our main business.

Me: OK, well in the future, will the support for these calculators (I point to a crate of Nspire CAS's)?

Person: Definitely, we won't be dropping support for these calculators since we are making OS 3.0 and they will be compatible with them.

Me: OK, thanks for that then, I guess I should be leaving now..

Person: OK, thanks! Have a good day!

Me: Wait, one more question.

Person: yeah?

Me: When will these things be released?

Person: In April.

Me: Do you know what day?

Person: No, all I know is that it's in April, and even then, that’s just my estimation.

Me: OK, thanks! See ya.

Conclusion: The Nspire CX will NOT be supporting new gaming capabilities and teachers ARE their business, so they don't care about us. The buttons were NOT rubber if anyone is wondering. I only looked at the home screen, moved the cursor a bit, glanced at the documents folder and that was about it. Sorry, I did not ask about the OS 2.53MP. The calculators were noticeably thinner than the current ones and look just like the pictures. The estimated time of arrival is in April.

EDIT: Corrected spelling mistakes at request.

edit edit: oohh icwutudidtharquerty.55 :P
« Last Edit: March 03, 2011, 09:42:03 pm by Snake X »
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Offline qazz42

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #1 on: March 01, 2011, 05:05:27 pm »
ok, Ndless all the way then, I really hope the ndless team can think of a way to fix this CX problem :/

sounds like a crappy  TI Prizm imo...
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Offline fb39ca4

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #2 on: March 01, 2011, 05:06:43 pm »
Nice info there :thumbsup:
Too bad you didn't ask about the sdk, though.
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Offline Snake X

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #3 on: March 01, 2011, 05:07:44 pm »
yeah sorry about that.. but I did try to get the main points
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Offline qazz42

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #4 on: March 01, 2011, 05:08:59 pm »
hmm, you forgot to ask about the TI-84 pocket, I just remembered D: is he still going to be there at all?
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Offline Snake X

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #5 on: March 01, 2011, 05:12:16 pm »
He works for the school so pretty much..
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Offline qazz42

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #6 on: March 01, 2011, 05:13:24 pm »
oh goodie, be sure to ask then :D
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Offline DJ Omnimaga

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #7 on: March 02, 2011, 04:07:52 pm »
Nice sort-of interview. :D

I guess that confirms even more that the new calc won't have any improvements on programming capabilities and that they mostly care about teachers, not programmers. Our only solution then will be Ndless.

In other words, this will be like a super-high-powered version of the Prizm hardware, but still as crippled as the old Nspire in terms of programming and still as hard to get used to.
« Last Edit: March 02, 2011, 04:08:54 pm by DJ_O »
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Offline coolrudski

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #8 on: March 02, 2011, 04:30:23 pm »
I think the lack still of programming on the nspire cx is a bad move by TI. Maybe they dont have to put an actual language on there, but they really should just leave the nspire open for c and asm programs and let the community build the support. instead they block it. and teachers even could benefit with c and asm programs as it allows for full use of the calculators potential, creating the ability to be more interactive with colors and graphics. as long as they do not purposefully block c and asm abilities (well attempt too) the community at least can build support.
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Offline DJ Omnimaga

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #9 on: March 02, 2011, 04:46:03 pm »
Yeah, what you said. I'm sure the community will win. However they don't help their reputation in the calc community. That said, sadly, the programmer community is only a small fraction of their userbase, so the only way to hurt their sales much would be that most programmers develop good games for the Prizm instead of the Nspire CX.
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Offline coolrudski

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #10 on: March 02, 2011, 04:52:21 pm »
Well i dont think the prizm has the hardware to back up powerful enough programs even with a lot of community support. There is someone no matter what TI does that will crack eventually whatever protection they put on there. they should just cut their losses and time and just allow c and asm support

and the prizm just isnt high powered enough in my opinion. the nspire cas blows it out of the water and now with the cx, I am not sure how casio can still compete with the Nspire. I dont think the programmers base though will move to the prizm, the hacks on the nspire now are better than most if not all the games developers have put on the prizms... I think either way TI wins, at least in the US
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Offline z80man

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #11 on: March 02, 2011, 05:09:19 pm »
Quote from: coolrudski on March 02, 2011, 04:52:21 pm
Well i dont think the prizm has the hardware to back up powerful enough programs even with a lot of community support. There is someone no matter what TI does that will crack eventually whatever protection they put on there. they should just cut their losses and time and just allow c and asm support

and the prizm just isnt high powered enough in my opinion. the nspire cas blows it out of the water and now with the cx, I am not sure how casio can still compete with the Nspire. I dont think the programmers base though will move to the prizm, the hacks on the nspire now are better than most if not all the games developers have put on the prizms... I think either way TI wins, at least in the US
There are a couple of things to keep in mind first. The Casio Prizm has only been out for just over 2 months now. The nspire though came out in 2007. Before Prizm programmers like me could even get started writing games we had to first document the hardware and the OS. Now we have documented many of the system calls and even have a C enviroment up now. With the hardware the CX has an upperhand on the memory I must admit, but speed is actually more equal than you think. The arm proc the nspire uses has a higher frequency than the Prizm's SH3, but the clock cycles for instructions are greater which causes slow downs.

btw: it seems like you are new here. welcome on the forums.  ;D
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List of stuff I need to do before September:
1. Finish the Emulator of the Casio Prizm (in active development)
2. Finish the the SH3 asm IDE/assembler/linker program (in active development)
3. Create a partial Java virtual machine  for the Prizm (not started)
4. Create Axe for the Prizm with an Axe legacy mode (in planning phase)
5. Develop a large set of C and asm libraries for the Prizm (some progress)
6. Create an emulator of the 83+ for the Prizm (not started)
7. Create a well polished game that showcases the ability of the Casio Prizm (not started)

Offline AngelFish

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #12 on: March 02, 2011, 05:13:50 pm »
Quote from: coolrudski on March 02, 2011, 04:52:21 pm
Well i dont think the prizm has the hardware to back up powerful enough programs even with a lot of community support. There is someone no matter what TI does that will crack eventually whatever protection they put on there. they should just cut their losses and time and just allow c and asm support

The hardware isn't powerful enough? I think you quite underestimate how powerful modern processors are. Look at the TI-83+ Series. That's a 6 MHz processor and it can run some incredibly impressive games. The Prizm, however, can overclock its processor to faster than the Nspire's normal running speed. So, to say it's not powerful enough is to say that the Nspire isn't powerful enough either. Yet I can pretty much guarantee you that the CAS on the Nspire isn't running on more than 90 MHz.
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Offline coolrudski

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #13 on: March 02, 2011, 05:15:52 pm »
why thank you!
and this is true but the prizm is gonna have a hard time competing with the cx's wi-fi and the ability to easily share files. but yes I imagine after some time the prizm will definitely have more support. casio really just needs a powerful calculator, with a cas, to be able to really compete with the nspire. cause i am in calculus and the prizm's functions do not do it for me, it just isn't powerful enough like the nspire cas. so maybe it'll be able to compete after tweaking and upgrades but the cx seems to be a real nail in the coffin , excluding programming support.
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Offline DJ Omnimaga

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Re: TI-Npsire CX: The Analysis!
« Reply #14 on: March 02, 2011, 05:18:00 pm »
I doubt the wi-fi will be popular enough. Sorry, but not a lot of students will spend $5000 on a Wi-fi device.
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